Cheap Apple iPhone Mini coming in 2014: Report

To gain market share in cost-sensitive markets like India and China, Apple is planning this move, predicts Strategy Analytics.

To counter Samsung, Apple may soon launch a cheaper version of its famous iPhone, according to Strategy Analytics.

"We think Apple will have to launch an 'iPhone Mini' at some point over the next three years to address the hundreds of millions of prepaid users worldwide that cannot afford the current iPhone," Neil Mawston, executive director at Strategy Analytics, quoted as saying by Reuters.

"We expect the iPhone Mini to be more likely next year, in 2014 when... Apple will be forced to discover fresh growth streams," he added.

Apple is expected to launch a newer version of iPhone, probably the rumoured iPhone 5S, soon. According to reports, Apple is also mulling to launch this handset in different display sizes out of which one could be the iPhone Mini which will be priced very affordably that would make it attractive in cost-sensitive markets like India and China, where Apple till now has little presence.

Apple also believed to ignore such cost-sensitive markets because of the price factor of its handsets. So it is palpable that Apple wanting to come up with a low cost iPhone to counter Samsung's advances, which last year become the No 1 smartphone maker in the world.